Drake’s ‘Views’ Stays Put Atop Album Chart

Robbie Daw | May 16, 2016 11:43 am

Drake continues to dominate the Billboard 200 for a second week with his latest LP Views, which racked up another 219,000 album units (173,000 of which were sales). Likewise, Beyonce sticks around at #2 with Lemonade, (202,000 units, 153,000 sales), which leaves Radiohead‘s A Moon Shaped Pool to enter at #3 with 173,000 copies sold. A Moon Shaped Pool is Radiohead’s ninth studio album, and sixth consecutive one of the nine to reach the top three positions of the Billboard 200. (To date, the UK band has topped the chart twice, with 2000’s Kid A and 2007’s In Rainbows.)

As for Drake’s Views, it’s now the first album to cross the 1 million copies sold mark in 2016. That said, don’t forget what we pointed out last week: When you see Views get awarded its inevitable Platinum status, remember that we are living in a time where the RIAA now figures streams, not just sales, into certifications, and last year’s “Hotline Bling” — a song with reportedly over 400 Spotify streams worldwide and 700 million YouTube plays — was tacked onto the album. How that affects an album like Views is, as Stereogum points out, like this: 1,500 on-demand audio and/or video song streams = 10 track sales = 1 album sale.

The Top 10 of the Billboard 200:

1. Drake, Views *2 weeks*
2. Beyonce, Lemonade
3. Radiohead, A Moon Shaped Pool *new*
4. Keith Urban, Ripcord *new*
5. PrinceThe Very Best Of Prince
6. Cole Swindell, You Should Be Here *new*
7. Rihanna, Anti
8. Prince, Purple Rain
9. Adele, 25
10. Chris Stapleton, Traveller

Any surprise moves on the chart this week for you? Let us know your thoughts below, or by hitting us up on Twitter and Facebook.